When I approached Dave Marcus [See Biography ] about providing an update of his whereabouts since leaving the newspaper industry, he found himself wrestling with the proper metaphor for a journalist who leaves the business. By a process of elimination, he sliced it down to two possibilities: an addict who gives up crack or the guy who gets jilted by the most beautiful girl in high school.
When Marcus stepped away from his position at Newsday in 2010, where he was covering education, it completed his three decade long rendezvous with journalism, which began in the bureau of The Miami Herald, where he was covering education, appropriately enough.
His journey spanning the globe, (which in addition to the Miami Herald and Newsday) has included tours of duty with the Boston Globe, Dallas Morning News, and US News & World Report as a society columnist, roving national reporter, and foreign correspondent, taking him into the heart of Mexico City to cover events unfolding in one of the most important financial centers in North America. He also spent time covering the deadly anti-narcotics campaign in Colombia. Other assignments abroad (nearly 50 countries) have included reporting the historic breakup of the Soviet Union, the US military invasion of Panama, the 1991 Gulf War, and the return of Hong Kong to China.
Along the way, he parachuted into Uzbekistan, Angola, Haiti and other major hot spots for coups, quakes, and even managed to pound out a feature about a 110-year old woman living in rural Texas, who got her first phone.
In 1994, Marcus shared a Pulitzer Prize while at the Dallas Morning News for International Reporting for a series about violence against women around the world. In 1990, he was a member of a team of Pulitzer finalists in Explanatory Journalism, for “Hidden Wars,” a look at conflicts in Africa, Latin America and Asia.
Marcus isn’t shy about showering heaps of praise on some of the greatest newspaper editors he claims he was lucky enough to have been surrounded with through the years, namely, Gene Miller, Doug Clifton, John Brecher, David Shribman, and Phil Bennett.
And while there have been plenty of triumphs, conquests, and jubilant highs during Marcus’s distinguished career, there certainly have been some lows as well, such as being mugged and pistol-whipped in a taxi in Mexico; or surveying the damage from Pablo Escobar’s car bombs in Colombia; or having the living room window in his home and office shot in Bogota, while discovering a 9 mm slug in his couch.
Clearly, though, the biggest low point in Marcus’s career has been witnessing the collapse of the newspaper industry. In particular, the layoffs at U.S. News & World Report and a 10 percent paycut at Newsday left this well traveled journalist dispirited and discouraged. “I loved journalism’’ Marcus told me, “but the business turned miserly and querulous. ‘’
Taking a quick overview of Marcus’s career, it becomes apparent that the topic which remains near and dear to his heart is with education, which has led him to writing books, one of which came during a sabbatical from U.S. News & World Report. He wrote “What It Takes To Pull Me Through: Why Teenagers Get in Trouble and How Four Got Out’’ , a book which chronicles the true story of a group of teenagers who engaged in drug use, drank excessively, ran away from home and quietly suffered depression. He later spent three years researching and writing a nonfiction book: “Acceptance: A Legendary Guidance Counselor Helps Seven Kids Find the Right College – and Find Themselves (Penguin Press). The book is intended for high school students as well as adults.
And like many journalists looking for new careers outside of print journalism, Marcus has reinvented himself as a speaker at high schools and conferences, stretching from Beverly Hills, Calif., to Derryfield, NH.
In addition to public speaking tours, Marcus has taken to blogging from time to time for The New York Times about higher education. A nice assignment except for the fact they follow the Huffington Post model and don’t pay for such contributions. He did receive several touching responses about a piece he wrote for the Times in 2010 about his 14-year old son who struggles with some classes in school.
Lately, as Marcus weighs what to do next, he tells me he’s fielded a number of offers from publishing houses to write another book, but his children (presumably knowing how self-absorbed he becomes when committing to writing projects) have begged him to put off writing a book, at least for a while.
Still, he is giving serious thought to a ghost writing project dealing with a book about divorce, a subject he knows all too well-since he went through one. Marcus jokes that since he survived a divorce, just like he survived Pablo Escobar’s car bombs, maybe he is destined to work on this project after all.
Aside from exploring possible writing projects, ever since he was a cub reporter at The Miami Herald, Marcus has fantasized about being a stand-up comic. Turns out, his dream will turn into a reality soon as he finally worked up enough courage to perform live. He’s in the process of polishing his act. But with 30 years of journalism under his belt, he said he’s well stocked with material. We’ll just have to wait to see if his humor is close to the philosophy and social criticism of Lenny Bruce or the rapid fire one-liners of Henny Youngman.
Marcus graduated from Brown University; and later studied Latin American literature at the University of the Andes in Bogota, Colombia. During his journalism career he took a year off to spend time as a Nieman Fellow at Harvard, with a concentration on urban planning and immigration.
He has been a visiting lecturer at the University of Houston, a visiting professor at the University of Massachusetts and a Woodrow Wilson Visiting Fellow at three colleges.
–Bill Lucey
WPLucey@gmail.com
July 23, 2012
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